Star Force: Nexus (SF57) Read Online Free Page B

the Nexus and how you’ve been fighting
them. If I had your resources the lizards would have been defeated long before
now and I don’t see why they’re beating you .”
    “ They are not
defeating us ,” Gfatt countered.
    “ They are
surviving and expanding, correct? ”
    “ Correct .”
    “ Then they are
winning and defeating your stated objective .”
    “ The Nexus
survives fully intact, we have not lost a world. There is no defeat .”
    “ Maybe this is
translation issue. You are not winning, correct? ”
    “ We have not won
a complete victory, no .”
    “ Then I need to
see how you are fighting and what you have available in order to point out
where you’re going wrong .”
    “ Strategic
information is limited to outsiders .”
    “ Give me as much
as you can, then I will compare and contrast between our battles with the
lizards and yours .”
    The Gfatt turned and conversed with another beside it,
with their whisper being too low for her translation software to digest, but a
moment later the original Gfatt altered the sandbox and a slew of new objects
appeared, some being starmaps and others ship
profiles.
    “ We will extend
internal public information rights to you for the purpose of this conference.
Ask and we shall answer what we are allowed .”
    Kerrie looked over the various ships, then pointed to
one of the smaller ones. “ Let’s start
here .”

 
 
    3

 
 
    January 3, 2637
    Danba System (lizard
territory)
    Vani

 
    Liam-090 studied the holograms in the command nexus
aboard his Warship -class jumpship as
he began to mentally link into the Ikrid control sphere and begin issuing
orders to his raiding fleet, which was spread throughout the enemy-occupied
system just on the far side of the ‘neutral zone’ beyond Alpha Region. They
were about to stage a naval attack on the key lizard stronghold in order to
beat down some of the excessive growth the planet was undergoing, and to do the
maximum amount of damage possible Liam needed to adapt his fleet positioning to
what the lizards were showing.
    The lag made it tricky, with his own ship being in
null space between the planet and star but close enough that a low speed
microjump would get him there within a few minutes. He needed to be close to
monitor the fleet positions without them being able to see him, for the sensor
dampening hull plates that Star Force now fielded made the long range lizard
sensors virtually useless unless they knew where to focus their attention.
    The reverse was no longer true, for it had been Star
Force that once had difficulty tracking the lizards’ own stealth plating, but
right now their ship hulls were literally gleaming in reflectivity that Liam’s
passive sensors were registering and giving him half a planet’s worth of
orbital signatures to gather information from. He had another jumpship on the
far side, and between the two of them and others relaying the signals, he was
looking at a low detailed position map of everything the lizards had in orbit
around Vani .
    Beside him he had two more holograms for the other
inhabited planets in the system, but neither was a tenth of the density of this
one. The others were start up projects, further deepening this system’s
resource base and defenses, but a little orbital bombardment would fix most of
that while the bulk of Liam’s fleet was going after Vani …or
to be more precise, the fleet surrounding it.
    They had some 28,000 cruisers or better in orbit,
clumped together into various formations with others moving about in patrol.
The other two planets were virtually barren of orbital defense ships, with
these just being a short microjump away if needed. Liam had 6 jumpships in his
fleet, plus two Ma’kri, and unless the lizards fought extremely stupid there
was no way Star Force was going to beat them.
    They were here to do damage and pull out, a quick poke
to bleed off some of their strength, though depending on how the enemy
responded it might turn out to